Three Cold War Crises

Three Cold War Crises

1. 5.1: Berlin: A divided city, 1961

   • The situation in Berlin
     • Berlin = Source of conflict for the Allies
       • Contrast between high standard of living in the West + poverty in East
       • 3 million people escaped from East to West Berlin 1946-60
         • Economic survival of East Germany at stake
     • Berlin Wall, 1961
       • All movement from East to West stopped
       • Immediate effects: flow of refugees reduced to a trickle + propaganda fail for the USSR and communism itself
       • Propaganda victory for USA
       • Berlin Wall symbol of division between capitalist West and communist East, 1960s-80s
     • Kennedy's response, 1963
       • Visited West Berlin
       • Declared the city was a symbol of the struggle between forces of freedom and communist world

2. 5.2: Cuba: The world on the brink of war, 1962

   • Cuban Missile Crisis = most serious conflict between the USSR and the USA in history of Cold War
   • Castro and Cuba
     • CAUSES
       • Castro = Communist
         • Castro came to power in 1958.
         • USA had retaliated – cutting off aid, stop buying cotton, sugar, tobacco
           • Castro asked help from USSR
             • USSR keen on gaining influence in Cuba, close proximity to USA's coastline
               • Cuba less than 200km from USA's South-Eastern coastline.
               • In exchange for Cuba's sugar, they would provide them with machinery
             • 1961, Kennedy alarmed at what he saw as Communist threat
               • American support to invasion of Cuba by rebels
                 • Bay of Pigs, 1961
                   • Was a disaster/failed
     • EVENTS
       • 14 October 1962, US U2 spy plane located Soviet missile sites on Cuba.
         • US naval blockade on Cuba
           • US U2 spy plane shot down over Cuba
             • Attorney General Robert Kennedy proposed deal to USSR
               • The USA would withdraw missiles from Turkey as long as shooting of U2 spy plane was kept secret.
               • Khrushchev accepts deal
     • RESULTS
       • Major affect on superpower relations
         • USSR + USA realise that nuclear war had been possibility
         • Telephone hotline established – Direct communications between superpowers
         • Test Ban Treaty, 1963
           • Signed by Britain, USA + USSR.

3. 5.3: Czechoslovakia: The prague spring, 1968

   • 1967, Dubcek had become Communist Party Secretary in Czechoslovakia
     • Spring 1968, reforms:
       • Censorship of press ended
       • Other political parties allowed
       • Political prisoners released + Czech citizens granted greater freedom to travel abroad
       • Seen as major threat by new USSR leader, Brezhnev
       • Four months of freedom
   • Soviet reaction
     • EVENTS
       • August 1968, 400, 000 WTO troops entered Czechoslovakia
       • Arrested leading reformers + seized key cities
       • Dubcek resigned in 1969, replaced by Husak
   • The Brezhnev Doctrine
     • Force would be used whenever necessary to keep WTO countries under Soviet control
       • Showed Soviet leadership wouldn't accept reforms in WTO + rejection of Communism
     • Doctrine + Soviet actions in Czechoslovakia did nothing to improve relations between USA + USSR